IMAGES of West Dorset MP Oliver Letwin chucking documents into the bins of a London park may have surprised readers of the red-top tabloid that splashed this story.

But it probably won’t surprise his constituents who must be getting quite used to life with the county’s most colourful MP by now.

With Oliver ‘Bin’ Letwin around, it’s tempting to ask, who needs Boris Johnson?

Who could forget him dressing up as a Roman emperor during a debate for the 2001 election and being told by singer Billy Bragg, also in Roman attire, that he should: “Render unto Thatcher that which is Thatcher’s”?

Or the moment when a story about proposed tax cuts of £20 billion appeared during the same campaign, even though the then Tory leader, William Hague, was saying he would only make £8 billion worth of cuts and Letwin, while denying he was the source, got the blame?

He promptly went into what commentators claimed was hiding while the Labour Party rushed out a wanted poster with his face on it.

Even Gordon Brown joined in the fun. “Let Letwin speak,” he declared. “We should free the Dorset One!" In 2003, Oliver let it be known that he would give his arm to send his children to a fee-paying school.

“If necessary I would go out on the streets and beg rather than send them to the school (in Lambeth) next to where I live,” he announced.

Not that he would even need to consider the cost of such a move: like Boris Johnson and the Prime Minister, Letwin was educated at Eton and has earned big money in the city.

However, unlike Johnson, who believes that “people’s ability to take a holiday” is a matter for “social justice” and who is in favour of more air travel from in and out of the capital, it is alleged that Letwin has said: “We don’t want more people from Sheffield flying away on cheap holidays.”

Like many of his fellow politicians, Letwin was caught up in the expenses scandal which rocked Westminster to its foundations.

He claimed money to have the Aga in his constituency home maintained and in September 2006, according to the Daily Telegraph: “An invoice for £2,145 was submitted by Mr Letwin for “works ... to lay a new 25mm pipeline to replace the existing leaking pipeline under the tennis court”.

Considering all this, sticking documents in public bins sounds like par for the Letwin course.

Indeed, as a spokesman was quoted saying: “Oliver Letwin does some of his parliamentary and constituency correspondence in the park before going to work and sometimes disposes of copies of letters there. They are not documents of a sensitive nature.”

Maybe. But Bournemouth Borough Council at least may feel a little hurt that its letter to him about the Green Investment Bank found its way into the public trash can. Never mind any from his constituents.

But do they mind?

Despite attempts by Billy Bragg’s tactical voting campaign to flip him off his West Dorset seat, he clung on and increased his parliamentary majority.

In West Dorset eyes at least, he must be doing something right.